I’d like to say I first noticed the long rectangle of yellow light. There I was, at the Whitney Museum, wandering around with a group of women poet friends, armed with our Moleskines and ink pens and our plan for after when we’d eat decadent food and drink something with bubbles, and suddenly I found myself standing in front of Edward Hopper’s 1961 painting, A Woman in the Sun.
The woman is in the sun, yes, but the sun isn’t visible. We know it’s there from the long rectangle of yellow light; from the shadow cast of the woman’s legs; from the title itself. But of course, it wasn’t the sun I was interested in, or the wooden bedposts or the black pumps or the blue sky out the window; it wasn’t the colors or the cinematic composition; it wasn’t even the cigarette. All I could see were the...
